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Bäladiri
General Information Bäladiri is a Westerlander language of the central lowlands. Despite its general genetic affiliation with other Westerlander languages, it is part of the lowlands Sprachbund, having come under the influence of several dragon herder languages. Bäladiri is, generally speaking, an agglutinative language that features prominent consonant gradation patterns triggered by stress shifts and certain types of affixes. It features marginally distinctive stress that tends to be either penultimate or antepenultimate. It has some partially opaque and obscured stem alternations deriving from earlier gradation and contraction rules. Bäladiri is natively written in a Westerlander abugida, with a Dragon Imperial implementation used among certain communities. Phonology /pp p b tt t d kk k g ʔ/ <'pp p b tt t d kk k g x'> /f v vv θ ð s z ʂ ʐ x γ/ <'f v vv θ ð s z š ž h gh'> /mm m ɳɳ ɳ ɲɲ ɲ ŋŋ ŋ/ <'mm m nn n nnj nj nng ng'> /rr r ll l jj j/ <'rr r ll l jj j'> /ts tts dz ddz tʂ ttʂ dʐ ddʐ/ <'ts tts dz ddz tš ttš dž ddž'> /i i: y y: ɨ ɯ ɯ: u u:/ <'i ī y ȳ ï o ō u ū'> /ɛ ɛ: ø ø: ɜ ɜ:/ <'e ē ø ø̄ ë eu'> /ɐ ɑ ɑ:/ <'ä a ā'> /ɑi ɑu iɑ ɛɑ ɛi/ <'ai au ia ea ei'> Bäladiri features marginally distinctive stress in a few loanwords and the occasional native relic or remnant. As its stress falls almost exclusively on the penultimate syllable, it isn't considered salient enough a feature to be marked in common usage; stress is indicated only in linguistic descriptions. Consonant Gradation Bäladiri features prominent consonant mutation that takes the form of gradation: its gradation is a lenition system that weakens consonants in certain morphological environments. Most consonants are considered to lie somewhere on an axis, moving down it when specific types of lenition are triggered. As a result of several phonemic merges and multiple consonant shifts, many consonants have multiple lenited forms. The consonantal axes are: Grammar Nouns Bäladiri nouns generally fit into only one declension: they all take the same set of suffixes (though their nominative singulars might be unique), but are characterised by the presence of two stems; this phenomenon derives from earlier stress alternations that then caused consonant lenition and vowel reduction. They inflect for five cases (nominative, accusative, ergative, vocative and oblique), and two numbers (singular and plural); the singular is generally characterised by an etymological nasal in the accusative and ergative, and the plural by a dental in all cases. Some Bäladiri nouns preserve a more ancient dual, which is characterised by the presence of a labial obstruent. >> Example nouns << ----------------------- SG PL NOM mávës máutis *mȧva-s ACC máunas máutas ERG máuna máuta VOC máve máutë OBL mávë mávët ------------------------ SG PL NOM máθïl máultis *mȧθul-Ø ACC máulnas máultas ERG máulna máulta VOC máule/máθe máultë OBL máθï(l) máθï(l)t samúnas *sȧppu-s ughónas *u̇ko-t sûnas *su̇ŋa < *su̇ŋa-s báunas *bȧsus ghavrínas *ḡȧpri možvúnas *mȯčpu kāmánas *kȧwaman folvínas *folpin (loanword) parvínas *pȧrpi (loanword) ärkáunas *ärka-džu (loanword) ilughánas *i-lu̇na Adjectives Bäladiri adjectives come in two classes: one class of nominal adjectives that stand with nouns and modify them directly, and one class of verbal adjectives that conjugate and are usually used as modifiers through relative clauses. Verbs Bäladiri verbs have a complex conjugation: they agree in number and person to their primary argument, and further conjugate for tense and aspect. Unlike nominals, Bäladiri verbs have a dual in addition to a singular and plural. They distinguish between the present, imminent (essentially a prospective present and future) and past tenses, and the momentane and continuous aspects. Bäladiri verbs also have an infinitive that acts as both a verbal complement to light verbs, and as general abstract verbal nouns of the verbs. The verbal infinitive features case and number inflection identical to that of regular nouns. Verbs in Bäladiri come in three productive conjugational classes based on thematic vowels in earlier stages of the language. Even as sound changes have obscured a lot of the more transparent inflections, the conjugations of such verbs still remain readily apparent throughout their paradigms. The three classes, in traditional terminology, are: * Lunate verbs (those with a thematic *ū in suffixes) * Solar verbs (those with a thematic *ī in suffixes) * Earthy verbs (those with a thematic *ā in suffixes) Two more classes are recognised, even though they have since mostly fallen out of use: * Mortal or Weak verbs (those with a thematic short { *a *i *u }; reanalysed as one of the three productive classes) * Muddy verbs (those with a thematic syllabic nasal { *m *n }; irregular, preserved in relics) The assignment of verbs to conjugational classes goes back to a verb classification system once operational in proto-North-Westerlander but defunct long before Bäladiri times. Some verbs that share conjugational class might also have morphosyntactic or semantic similarities, though the system has truly been irregularised due to class reassignments and semantic shifts. Bäladiri verbs are cited in three forms, representing the three lenition grades a regular verb stem has: * Strongest, unlenited — second person singular, present momentane * Medium — first person singular, present momentane * Weakest, most lenited — infinitive nominative singular Even though the stems can be predicted for most verbs from just one form, all verbs are cited in three parts because of lenition and vowel contraction irregularities or omissions extant in the system. Example conjugation of an earthy verb: Syntax 'General Word Order' Bäladiri has a generally free word order, as its extensive inflections give it configurational liberty. Even as such, Bäladiri tends to follow the principle of putting its objects and intransitive subjects before the verb, and transitive agents and other arguments after it. 'Case Marking' Case marking in Bäladiri is generally straightforward. Aside from the adpositions that require a specific case nearly at random, the language assigns cases fairly logically: *The Nominative marks the subjects and agents of active sentences, and the patient role in a passive sentence *The Accusative marks the patient role of active sentences *The Ergative marks the agent role of a passive sentence (a former demoted nominative) *The Vocative marks an addressed party *The Oblique marks secondary arguments; almost never occurs without an adposition Some verbs require different case assignments respective to argument roles; this phenomenon of quirky case most frequently occurs with the three core cases. 'Passivisation' Unlike proto-North-Westerlander, Bäladiri lacks a specific passive verb inflection or analytic construction; Bäladiri passives are formed by case reassignment. With passivisation, the accusative argument gets promoted to the nominative, whereas the old nominative argument is demoted to an ergative. These pseudopassive sentences are syntactically and semantically identical to absolutive-ergative active sentences; the nominative patients of these sentences come before the verb, and their ergative agents follow the verb. 'Verb Agreement' Bäladiri verbs feature a more ergative syntactic alignment: they agree in person and number to the intransitive subject and the transitive patient, instead of agreeing with a specific case argument. 'Relative Clauses' Bäladiri relative clauses are introduced with the relative demonstrative <'gímïs'> (declines like a regular noun). See Also -- History of Bäladiri -- Lexicon Category:Languages